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  • DOJ opens investigation into leaks of apparent classified US military documents | CNN Politics

    DOJ opens investigation into leaks of apparent classified US military documents | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    The Department of Justice has opened an investigation into the leaks of a trove of apparent US intelligence documents that were posted on social media in recent weeks.

    The investigation comes as new documents surfaced Friday covering everything from US support for Ukraine to information about key US allies like Israel, widening the fallout from an already alarming leak. The Pentagon on Thursday said it was looking into the matter after social media posts of apparently classified documents on the war in Ukraine had emerged.

    The additional leaked documents that were surfaced on Friday by open-source intelligence researchers appear to have been posted online in the past few weeks. The documents appear to contain classified information on topics ranging from the mercenary Wagner Group’s operations in Africa and Israel’s pathways to providing lethal aid to Ukraine, to intelligence about the United Arab Emirates’ ties to Russia and South Korean concerns about providing ammunition to the US for use in Ukraine.

    CNN could not independently verify that the documents have not been altered. But they are similar to a tranche of classified documents about Ukraine that have been circulating online in recent weeks, which US officials on Friday morning confirmed to CNN to be authentic.

    Much like those documents, Friday’s discoveries were also photos of printed-out, wrinkled documents. All bore classified markings, some top secret – the highest level of classification. They also all appear to have been produced between mid-February and early March.

    It is unclear who is behind the leaks and where, exactly, they originated.

    “The Department of Defense is actively reviewing the matter, and has made a formal referral to the Department of Justice for investigation,” deputy Pentagon press secretary Sabrina Singh said Friday.

    A Justice Department spokesperson told CNN that the department has “been in communication with the Department of Defense related to this matter and have begun an investigation,” declining to comment further.

    The leak has rattled Pentagon officials, particularly within the Defense Department’s Joint Staff, which comprises the DoD’s most senior uniformed leadership, whose role is to advise the president. Many of the documents had markings indicating that they were produced by the Joint Staff’s intelligence arm, known as J2, and appear to be briefing documents.

    Earlier Friday, US officials confirmed that similar documents about Ukraine were part of a larger daily intelligence briefing deck produced by the Pentagon about the war for senior leadership.

    US officials suggested that a leak investigation would look inward, at potential culprits inside the Pentagon. But a person familiar with US intelligence said a probe would likely not be limited to the Pentagon, given the large number of people across the government who have access to these kinds of documents. Some of the documents also have markings indicating that they were shared with countries in the Five Eyes intelligence alliance – the US, Australia, Canada, New Zealand and the United Kingdom.

    Other markings indicate the inclusion of material from other agencies, such as the State Department’s intelligence arm, the Defense Intelligence Agency, the National Geospatial-Intelligence Agency, and the National Security Agency.

    Many of the documents, however, also have markings indicating they are sourced from human intelligence and not meant to be shared with foreign nationals, even the closest US allies.

    Some of documents reference classified information from the CIA. An agency spokesperson told CNN on Friday, “We are aware of the social media posts and are looking into the claims.”

    Images of some of the documents – which include estimates of Russian casualties and a list of Western weapons systems available to Ukraine – were posted to the social media platform Discord in early March, according to screenshots of the posts reviewed by CNN.

    “This sh*t was sitting in a Minecraft Discord server for a month and no one noticed,” Aric Toler, a researcher at investigative outlet Bellingcat who traced the timeline of the posted documents, told CNN. Minecraft is a popular video game.

    It wasn’t until this week that the leaked documents started to gain more attention after someone posted a portion of the documents to 4chan, a web forum popular with extremists, and then a Russian speaker posted an altered version of one of the documents on Telegram, Toler said.

    US officials believe someone altered that document to make the estimated number of Ukrainians killed in the war far higher than it actually is.

    The Pentagon said Thursday that it was aware of the social media posts and it was investigating the matter.

    On Discord on Friday, speculation and paranoia were rife, with some users wondering if they could get in trouble for re-posting the documents now that the US government is investigating the matter. A user who posted photos of the documents on March 1 appeared to have deleted his accounts on Twitter and Discord.

    “The fact that unedited and edited – doctored – versions of some files are available online makes me skeptical that this is a professional Russian intelligence operation,” Thomas Rid, an expert on state-backed information operations, told CNN.

    Historically, if an intelligence agency has access to classified material from an adversary and decides to falsify some of the material, they typically don’t make both versions of those documents public, said Rid, who is a professor at Johns Hopkins University’s School of Advanced International Studies.

    “That only makes it easier to detect the facts, and thus defeats the purpose,” Rid said.

    There is concern, however, that the leaked documents could have real-world impact.

    “If real, the leaking of these documents can do significant damage to Ukrainian counteroffensive since this information effectively provides Russia with Ukrainian order of battle — extensive information on capabilities of brigades that would be involved in upcoming counteroffensive,” said Dmitri Alperovitch, a Russia analyst who is executive chairman of Silverado Policy Accelerator.

    This headline and story have been updated with additional developments.

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  • China has not provided extensive assistance to Russia as part of its war against Ukraine even as the two countries forge closer ties, senior Treasury officials say | CNN Business

    China has not provided extensive assistance to Russia as part of its war against Ukraine even as the two countries forge closer ties, senior Treasury officials say | CNN Business

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    CNN
     — 

    While China and Russia have strengthened ties since the Kremlin’s brutal invasion of Ukraine, the US has not seen evidence that China has provided systemic material support to the Kremlin as Russian President Vladimir Putin and his government look for avenues to evade Western sanctions and backfill its military, according to senior US Treasury officials.

    One senior Treasury official said that China is, as of now, unwilling to provide material support to Russia at scale and in a significant way, pointing instead to Russian efforts to source material from North Korea and Iran. The comments come almost one month after revelations of US intelligence that China has been open to providing Russian with requested military and financial assistance, and US national security adviser Jake Sullivan warned top Chinese diplomat Yang Jiechi about American concerns over such a move.

    With relations between Washington and Beijing at historic lows, the senior officials attributed the decision by China to hold off so far on more systemic help to efforts across the sanctions coalition – from public US comments to active and direct messages that the Europeans have given to China.

    With Russia’s brutal invasion of Ukraine into its second year, the Biden administration has continued to take steps to plug the gaps of the Western allies’ sanctions regime as they broaden intelligence sharing with US allies and jurisdictions where Russia has looked to sidestep sanctions and export controls.

    The US and its allies have also taken more direct action, sanctioning a Chinese satellite company providing intelligence to Russian forces in January and putting some Chinese companies on the US export control list.

    As part of that effort and as leaders of the global financial system descend on Washington D.C. next week for the Spring Meetings of the International Monetary Fund and World Bank, top US Treasury and intelligence officials will share information with relevant partners to help countries and businesses understand how the Kremlin continues to use its intelligence services to try and evade the unprecedented sanctions regime instituted by the US and its allies, these senior officials also said.

    The meetings next week with countries the US is concerned about are part of a broader push by the Treasury over the next month as senior officials continue to fan out across the world to strategize with US allies and partners to deepen cooperation and ramp up the pressure on countries key to Russia’s sanctions evasion and backfilling efforts.

    Two of Treasury’s top sanctions officials – Brian Nelson and Liz Rosenberg – will continue the US government’s ramped up efforts internationally to speak to specific countries and their businesses about the risks of providing support to Russia and share detailed information on sanctions evasion. Nelson will travel to Switzerland, Italy, Austria and Germany to compare notes with their counterparts and continue to share intelligence on the ways in which Russia is attempting to evade sanctions; and, Rosenberg will travel to Kazakhstan in Central Asia, a region with a long history of ties to Russia, and through which officials have raised concerns that Russia is sourcing materials.

    Despite the impact sanctions have had on the Russian economy, some observers have pointed to concerns over Moscow’s ability to evade sanctions and re-orient trade routes to continue to acquire some of the technologies and financing needed to fund its war machine through countries it borders and more permissive jurisdictions, such as the United Arab Emirates and Turkey.

    But in recent months officials have also begun to see some results from their public and private efforts. Turkish officials told the US last month that their government has been taking further action to block the transit of sanctioned goods directly to Russia, according to a source familiar with the discussion.

    Since Russia launched its bloody war against Ukraine, the US has imposed thousands of sanctions against Russian politicians, oligarchs and companies, cut off the Russian central bank from its dollar-denominated reserves as well as the global financial messaging system, undermined Russia’s defense-industrial base and imposed a price cap on Russian oil and petroleum products.

    One of the most successful efforts, the price cap, has already been having a demonstrable effect with the Russian Finance Ministry announcing Friday a $29 billion dollar deficit in the budget for the first quarter of 2023, according to Reuters.

    In a speech earlier this year on the anniversary of Russia’s invasion, US Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo publicly warned Russian intelligence services that the US is monitoring their efforts and is cracking down.

    “We know Russia is actively seeking ways to circumvent these sanctions… In fact, one of the ways we know our sanctions are working is that Russia has tasked its intelligence services – the FSB and GRU – to find ways to get around them,” Adeyemo said in his February speech.

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  • Russia charges Wall Street Journal’s Evan Gershkovich with espionage | CNN

    Russia charges Wall Street Journal’s Evan Gershkovich with espionage | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Russian investigators have formally charged Wall Street Journal reporter Evan Gershkovich with espionage, Russian state media reported Friday, adding he denied the accusations. 

    “The FSB investigation charged Gershkovich with espionage in the interests of his country. He categorically denied all accusations and stated that he was engaged in journalistic activities in Russia,” an agency representative said, according to state news agency TASS. 

    The representative declined to comment further, as the journalist’s case was marked “top secret,” according to TASS. 

    Gershkovich was detained by Russian authorities last week, who accused him of spying, signaling a significant ratcheting of both Moscow’s tensions with the United States and its campaign against foreign news media.

    A Moscow court on April 18 will hear an appeal filed by Gershkovich’s lawyers against his arrest, Russian state media said citing the court. The correspondent is currently held in the notorious Leftereovo pre-detention center until May 29.

    Gershkovich’s arrest marks the first time an American journalist has been detained on accusations by Moscow of spying since the Cold War.

    The arrest has been widely condemned by western officials and the Journal vehemently denied the espionage charge against Gershkovich, describing his arrest “a vicious affront to a free press” which “should spur outrage in all free people and governments throughout the world.”

    On Wednesday, Secretary of State Antony Blinken said he urged Russian Foreign Minister Sergey Lavrov to release Gershkovich immediately.

    “In my own mind, there’s no doubt that he’s being wrongfully detained by Russia, which is exactly what I said to Foreign Minister Lavrov when I spoke to him over the weekend,” Blinken said during a press conference in Brussels. “But I want to make sure that as always, because there is a formal process, that we go through it and we will, and I expect that to be to be completed soon.”

    CNN reported on Tuesday that the Biden administration is preparing to officially declare Gershkovich as wrongfully detained in Russia, two US officials told CNN, a move that will trigger new US government resources to work towards his release.

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  • What the OPEC cuts mean for Putin and Russia | CNN Business

    What the OPEC cuts mean for Putin and Russia | CNN Business

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    A version of this story first appeared in CNN Business’ Before the Bell newsletter. Not a subscriber? You can sign up right here. You can listen to an audio version of the newsletter by clicking the same link.


    New York
    CNN
     — 

    Some of the world’s largest oil exporters shocked markets over the weekend by announcing that they would cut oil production by more than 1.6 million barrels a day.

    OPEC+, an alliance between the Organization of the Petroleum Exporting Countries (OPEC) and a group of non-OPEC oil-producing countries, including Russia, Mexico, and Kazakhstan, said on Sunday that the cuts would start in May, running through the end of the year. The news sent both Brent crude futures — the global oil benchmark — and WTI — the US benchmark — up about 6% in trading Monday.

    OPEC+ was formed in 2016 to coordinate and regulate oil production and stabilize global oil prices. Its members produce about 40% of the world’s crude oil and have a significant impact on the global economy.

    What it means for Putin: OPEC+’s decision to cut oil production could have big implications for Russia.

    After Russia invaded Ukraine last year, the United States and United Kingdom immediately stopped purchasing oil from the country. The European Union also stopped importing Russian oil that was sent by sea.

    Members of the G7 — an organization of leaders from some of the world’s largest economies: Canada, France, Germany, Italy, Japan, the United Kingdom and the United States — have also imposed a price cap of $60 per barrel on oil exported by Russia, keeping the country’s revenues artificially low. If oil prices continue to rise, some analysts have speculated that the US and other western nations may have to loosen that price cap.

    US Treasury Secretary Janet Yellen said Monday that the changes could lead to reassessing the price cap — though not yet. “Of course, that’s something that, if we’ve decided that it’s appropriate to revisit, could be changed, but I don’t see that that’s appropriate at this time,” she told reporters.

    “I don’t know that this is significant enough to have any impact on the appropriate level of the price cap,” she added.

    Russia also recently announced that it would lower its oil production by 500,000 barrels per day until the end of this year.

    Just last week Putin admitted that western sanctions could deal a blow to Russia’s economy.

    “The illegitimate restrictions imposed on the Russian economy may indeed have a negative impact on it in the medium term,” Putin said in televised remarks Wednesday reported by state news agency TASS.

    Putin said Russia’s economy had been growing since July, thanks in part to stronger ties with “countries of the East and South,” likely referring to China and some African countries.

    Russia, China and Saudi Arabia: The OPEC+ announcement came as a surprise this week. The group had already announced it would cut two million barrels a day in October of 2022 and Saudi Arabia previously said its production quotas would stay the same through the end of the year.

    “The move to reduce supply is fairly odd,” wrote Warren Patterson, head of commodities strategy at ING in a note Monday.

    “Oil prices have partly recovered from the turmoil seen in financial markets following developments in the banking sector,” he wrote. “Meanwhile, oil fundamentals are expected to tighten as we move through the year. Prior to these cuts, we were already expecting the oil market to see a fairly sizable deficit over the second half or 2023. Clearly, this will be even larger now.”

    Saudi Arabia stated that the cut is a “precautionary measure aimed at supporting the stability of the oil market,” but Patterson says it will likely “lead to further volatility in the market,” later this year as less available oil will add to inflationary feats.

    Still, the changes signal shifting global alliances with Russia, China and Saudi Arabia around oil prices, said analysts at ClearView Energy Partners. Higher-priced oil could help Russia pay for its war on Ukraine and also boosts revenue in Saudi Arabia.

    The White House, meanwhile, has spoken out against OPEC’s decision. “We don’t think cuts are advisable at this moment given market uncertainty – and we’ve made that clear,” National Security Council spokesman John Kirby said Monday.

    – CNN’s Paul LeBlanc and Hanna Ziady contributed to this report

    The crisis triggered by the recent collapses of Silicon Valley Bank and Signature Bank is not over yet and will ripple through the economy for years to come, said JPMorgan Chase CEO Jamie Dimon on Tuesday.

    In his closely watched annual letter to shareholders, the chief executive of the largest bank in the United States outlined the extensive damage the financial system meltdown had on all banks and urged lawmakers to think carefully before responding with regulatory policy.

    “These failures were not good for banks of any size,” wrote Dimon, responding to reports that large financial institution benefited greatly from the collapse of SVB and Signature Bank as wary customers sought safety by moving billions of dollars worth of money to big banks.

    In a note last month, Wells Fargo banking analyst Mike Mayo wrote “Goliath is winning.” JPMorgan in particular, he said, was benefiting from more deposits “in these less certain times.”

    “Any crisis that damages Americans’ trust in their banks damages all banks – a fact that was known even before this crisis,” said Dimon. “While it is true that this bank crisis ‘benefited’ larger banks due to the inflow of deposits they received from smaller institutions, the notion that this meltdown was good for them in any way is absurd.”

    The failures of SVB and Signature Bank, he argued, had little to do with banks bypassing regulations and that SVB’s high Interest rate exposure and large amount of uninsured deposits were already well-known to both regulators and to the marketplace at large.

    Current regulations, Dimon argued, could actually lull banks into complacency without actually addressing real system-wide banking issues. Abiding by these regulations, he wrote, has just “become an enormous, mind-numbingly complex task about crossing t’s and dotting i’s.”

    And while regulatory change will be a likely outcome of the recent banking crisis, Dimon argued that, “it is extremely important that we avoid knee-jerk, whack-a-mole or politically motivated responses that often result in achieving the opposite of what people intended.” Regulations, he said, are often put in place in one part of the framework but have adverse effects on other areas and just make things more complicated.

    The Federal Deposit Insurance Corporation has said it will propose new rule changes in May, while the Federal Reserve is currently conducting an internal review to assess what changes should be made. Lawmakers in Congress, like Democratic Sen. Sherrod Brown, have suggested that new legislation meant to regulate banks is in the works.

    But, wrote Dimon, “the debate should not always be about more or less regulation but about what mix of regulations will keep America’s banking system the best in the world.”

    Dimon’s letter to shareholders touched on a number of pressing issues, including climate change. “The window for action to avert the costliest impacts of global climate change is closing,” he wrote, expressing his frustration with slow growth in clean energy technology investments.

    “Permitting reforms are desperately needed to allow investment to be done in any kind of timely way,” he wrote.

    One way to do that? “We may even need to evoke eminent domain,” he suggested. “We simply are not getting the adequate investments fast enough for grid, solar, wind and pipeline initiatives.”

    Eminent domain is the government’s power to take private property for public use, so long as fair compensation is provided to the property owner.

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  • Russia arrests anti-war activist following blast that killed hawkish blogger | CNN

    Russia arrests anti-war activist following blast that killed hawkish blogger | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Russian authorities have detained a 26-year-old anti-war protester, claiming she was involved in the blast that killed well-known military blogger Vladlen Tatarsky at a cafe in St. Petersburg on Sunday.

    The country’s interior ministry added Daria Trepova to a wanted list following the explosion, and her arrest was announced on Telegram by the Investigative Committee of Russia shortly after that.

    State media outlet TASS reported that “preliminarily, it was Trepova who handed Tatarsky a figurine with explosives” at the cafe. Russian media had reported suggestions that Tatarsky may have been killed by a device hidden in a statue presented to him by a woman. CNN is not able to independently verify the claims.

    Russia’s National Anti Terrorism Committee said Monday that the explosion involved agents of the Ukrainian special services and associates of the jailed opposition leader Alexey Navalny.

    Tatarsky, a hawkish blogger who gained a high profile for his commentary on Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, was killed when a blast tore through the cafe where he was appearing as a guest of a pro-war group called Cyber Front Z.

    Trepova was arrested in the early days of the conflict for demonstrating against it, TASS reported.

    “Trepova participated in an unsanctioned rally on the day the special military operation began in Ukraine and was subjected to administrative arrest,” the article read, adding that court records confirmed that Trepova was arrested on March 9, 2022 and sentenced to 10 days in prison.

    According to the TASS article, law enforcement officers conducted a search at Trepovas’ residence in St. Petersburg on Sunday night, where her sister and mother were also questioned. Trepova’s husband Dmitry Rylov was a member of the Libertarian Party of Russia, the article said. Trepova, however, was not associated with the party.

    Russian state media Ria Novosti quoted one witness of Sunday’s blast as saying: “This woman sat at our table. I saw her from the back as she was turned away. When she gifted him the figurine, she went to sit in a different place by the window and forgot her phone at our table.”

    The witness added: “The host at the stage took the figurine from the box and showcased it, Vladlen held it for a bit. They put it back and shortly after the explosion happened … I was running and my ears were blocked. There were many people with blood on them.”

    The independent Telegram channel Astra Press quoted a witness as saying: “Everyone rushed to the exit when explosion happened. I myself saw the girl only until the moment of the explosion, when she gave a gift. She looked like an ordinary person.”

    Tatarsky supported the war in Ukraine and had gained popularity since the start of what Russia calls its “special military operation” by providing analysis and commentary.

    Tatarsky, whose real name is Maxim Fomin, created his Telegram channel in 2019, naming it in honor of the protagonist of Victor Pelevin’s novel “Generation ‘P,’” according to Russian state news agency Vesti. He had since written several books.

    Before that, in 2014, Tatarsky took part in fighting alongside Russian forces in the Donbas region of eastern Ukraine, according to Vesti, citing public sources, when President Vladimir Putin’s fighters first invaded the country.

    Emergency service workers stand at the site of the blast at the St. Petersburg cafe on Sunday.

    Tatarsky had more than half a million followers on Telegram, and while he was aggressively pro-war, he had sometimes been critical of Russian setbacks in Ukraine.

    In May last year, he told CNN that he was not criticizing the overall operation, rather “individual episodes,” and that he still believed Russia would achieve its goals in Ukraine.

    Tatarsky gained prominence after attending the ceremony in the Kremlin that marked the illegal annexation of four Ukrainian regions.

    Sunday’s blast has echoes of the car bombing that killed Darya Dugina, the daughter of influential ultra-nationalist philosopher Alexander Dugin in August 2022. Alexander Dugin is credited with being the architect, or “spiritual guide,” to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Dugina and Tatarsky moved in the same circles, and they had been photographed multiple times together

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  • Prominent Russian military blogger killed in St. Petersburg cafe blast | CNN

    Prominent Russian military blogger killed in St. Petersburg cafe blast | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    A well-known Russian military blogger was killed in an explosion at a cafe in St. Petersburg on Sunday, officials said, in what appeared to be an audacious attack on a high-profile pro-Kremlin figure.

    Vladlen Tatarsky died when a blast tore through the cafe where he was appearing as a guest of a pro-war group called Cyber Front Z. Authorities said they were treating the case as suspected murder.

    Twenty-five other people were injured in the blast, 19 of whom were hospitalized, the city’s governor said. The Russian Ministry of Health said six people were in critical condition. Investigators were questioning everyone who was inside the cafe, state media reported. Photos of the scene showed extensive damage to the building in which the cafe was located.

    Russia’s Investigative Committee for St. Petersburg said it had opened a murder investigation. Investigators and forensic specialists were on scene, the agency said, and that it was working to establish the circumstances surrounding the explosion. Russia’s Interior Ministry also confirmed Tatarsky was killed in the blast.

    St. Petersburg’s prosecutor Viktor Melnik traveled to the scene to coordinate the actions of emergency services and law enforcement agencies, TASS reported.

    Russian media reports suggested that Tatarsky may have been killed by a device hidden in a figurine presented to him by a woman before the blast. Russian state news media, citing law enforcement agencies and eyewitness accounts, said the woman was attending the event at which Tatarsky was speaking.

    Ria Novosti quoted one witness as saying: “This woman sat at our table. I saw her from the back as she was turned away. When she gifted him the figurine, she went to sit in a different place by the window and forgot her phone at our table.”

    The witness added: “The host at the stage took the figurine from the box and showcased it, Vladlen held it for a bit. They put it back and shortly after the explosion happened… I was running and my ears were blocked. There were many people with blood on them.”

    The independent Telegram channel Astra Press quoted a witness as saying: “Everyone rushed to the exit when explosion happened. I myself saw the girl only until the moment of the explosion, when she gave a gift. She looked like an ordinary person.”

    CNN is not able to independently verify the claims.

    The blast occured during an event hosted by the “Cyber Front Z” movement, a pro-war Telegram society. “Dear friends and colleagues,” the group said in a post Sunday. “During our regular event in a cafe we rented, there was a terrorist attack. We took certain security measures, but, unfortunately, they were not enough. Our condolences to the families and friends of the victims.”

    “Separate condolences to everyone who knew the wonderful war correspondent and our good friend Vladlen Tatarsky. Now we are cooperating with law enforcement agencies and we hope that all those responsible will be punished,” the post said.

    Tatarsky supported the war in Ukraine, had gained popularity since the start of what Russia calls its “special military operation” by providing analysis and commentary.

    Tatarsky, whose real name is Maxim Fomin, created his Telegram channel in 2019, naming it in honor of the protagonist of Victor Pelevin’s novel “Generation ‘P,’” according to Russian state news agency Vesti. He had since written several books.

    Before that, in 2014, Tatarsky fought against Ukrainian nationalists with the Donbas resistance, according to Vesti, citing public sources.

    Tatarsky had more than half a million followers on Telegram, and while he was aggressively pro-war, he had sometimes been critical of Russian setbacks in Ukraine.

    In May last year, he told CNN that he was not criticizing the overall operation, rather “individual episodes,” and that he still believed Russia would achieve its goals in Ukraine.

    Tatarsky gained prominence after attending the ceremony in the Kremlin that marked the illegal annexation of four Ukrainian regions.

    Sunday’s blast has echoes of the car bombing that killed Darya Dugina, the daughter of influential ultra-nationalist philosopher Alexander Dugan in August 2022. Alexander Dugan is credited with being the architect, or “spiritual guide,” to Russia’s invasion of Ukraine. Dugina and Tatarsky moved in the same circles, and they had been photographed multiple times together.

    No evidence has yet been presented about who carried out the attack on Tatarsky, but Russian Foreign Ministry spokeswoman Maria Zakharova pointed the finger at Ukraine, without citing evidence.

    “Russian journalists are constantly experiencing threats of reprisal from the Kyiv regime and its inspirers, which are increasingly being implemented,” Zakharova said.

    A Ukrainian official suggested the killing was due to in-fighting in Russia. Mykhailo Podolyak, an adviser to the President’s office, wrote on Twitter: “Spiders are eating each other in a jar. Question of when domestic terrorism would become an instrument of internal political fight was a matter of time.”

    Zakharova paid tribute to Tatarskiy. “The professional activities of Vladlen Tatarskiy, his service to the Motherland aroused hatred among the Kyiv regime. He was dangerous for them, but boldly went to the end, doing his duty.” Zakharova said.

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  • Wimbledon to allow Russian and Belarusian players to compete this year | CNN

    Wimbledon to allow Russian and Belarusian players to compete this year | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Wimbledon will accept entries from Russian and Belarusian players for this year’s tournament if they agree to compete as neutral athletes and comply with “appropriate conditions,” organizers announced Friday in a statement.

    Tennis players from Russia and Belarus were banned from playing in last year’s championships following Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, resulting in the men’s and women’s professional tours – the ATP and WTA – and the International Tennis Federation (ITF) stripping Wimbledon of its ranking points.

    Entry conditions for this year’s event, one of tennis’ four majors, include prohibiting “expressions of support for Russia’s invasion of Ukraine,” while players who receive funding from the Russian or Belarusian state will not be allowed to compete, including those receiving sponsorship from companies operated or controlled by them.

    “We continue to condemn totally Russia’s illegal invasion and our wholehearted support remains with the people of Ukraine,” Ian Hewitt, chairman of the All England Club, said in a statement. “This was an incredibly difficult decision, not taken lightly or without a great deal of consideration for those who will be impacted.

    “It is our view that, considering all factors, these are the most appropriate arrangements for The Championships for this year. We are thankful for the Government’s support as we and our fellow tennis stakeholder bodies have navigated this complex matter and agreed on conditions we believe are workable.

    “If circumstances change materially between now and the commencement of The Championships, we will consider and respond accordingly.”

    The All England Club said the entry conditions had been “carefully developed” through conversations with the UK government, the Lawn Tennis Association – Britain’s national governing tennis body – and international stakeholders.

    It added that the decision has the “full support” of the UK government, the LTA, ATP, WTA and ITF.

    “The ITF’s position on this issue has been clear and consistent from the start and remains the same,” the ITF, world tennis’ governing body, said in a statement.

    “We acted swiftly to suspend the Russian Tennis Federation and Belarus Tennis Federation from ITF membership and from participation in ITF international competitions until further notice.

    Russian and Belarusian players will have to compete as neutral athletes.

    “At the time we recognised that there would be specific responses from nations, and this is what we saw with the LTA and All England Lawn Tennis Club last year. Their collective position has now evolved, and we continue to work closely with them on this issue.

    “Tennis stands in solidarity with Ukraine.”

    In a joint statement released Friday, the WTA and ATP said it is “pleased that all players will have an opportunity to compete at Wimbledon and LTA events this summer.”

    “It has taken a collaborative effort across the sport to arrive at a workable solution which protects the fairness of the game,” the statement added.

    “This remains an extremely difficult situation and we would like to thank Wimbledon and the LTA for their efforts in reaching this outcome, while reiterating our unequivocal condemnation of Russia’s war on Ukraine.”

    Wimbledon takes place this year from July 3 to July 16.

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  • Putin admits sanctions could hurt Russia’s economy | CNN Business

    Putin admits sanctions could hurt Russia’s economy | CNN Business

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    London
    CNN
     — 

    President Vladimir Putin has conceded that Western sanctions designed to starve the Kremlin of funds for its invasion of Ukraine could deal a blow to Russia’s economy.

    “The illegitimate restrictions imposed on the Russian economy may indeed have a negative impact on it in the medium term,” Putin said in televised remarks Wednesday reported by state news agency TASS.

    It is a rare admission by the Russian leader, who has repeatedly insisted that Russia’s economy remains resilient and that sanctions have hurt Western countries by driving up inflation and energy prices.

    Putin said Russia’s economy had been growing since July, thanks in part to stronger ties with “countries of the East and South,” likely referring to China and some African countries. He also stressed the importance of domestic demand to the economy, saying it was becoming the leading driver of growth.

    Russia’s economy has showed surprising resilience to unprecedented sanctions imposed by the West, including an EU ban on most imports of oil products. Preliminary estimates from the Russian government show that economic output shrank by 2.1% last year — a contraction more limited than many economists initially predicted.

    Yet while China has thrown the Kremlin an economic lifeline by buying Russian energy and providing an alternative to the US dollar, cracks are starting to appear.

    The Russian government’s revenue plunged 35% in January compared with a year ago, while expenditures jumped 59%, leading to a budget deficit of about 1,761 billion rubles ($23.3 billion).

    The World Bank and the Organization for Economic Cooperation and Development are forecasting contractions of 3.3% and 5.6%, respectively, in 2023. The International Monetary Fund expects Russia’s growth to remain flat this year, but for the economy to shrink by at least 7% in the medium term.

    In response to Russia’s aggression in Ukraine, Western countries have announced more than 11,300 sanctions since the February 2022 invasion, and frozen some $300 billion of Russia’s foreign reserves.

    An outspoken Russian oligarch, Oleg Deripaska, said earlier this month that Russia could find itself with no money as soon as next year.

    Separately, Austrian bank Raiffeisen Bank International said Thursday it was looking to sell or spin off its Russian business. In a statement, the bank called market conditions in the country “highly complex” and said it was “committing to further reducing business activity” there.

    Raiffeisenbank Russia made just over $2 billion in profit last year. But due to strict local rules, Raiffeisen is unable to take any profits from its Russian business out of the country.

    — Rob North and Livvy Doherty contributed reporting.

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  • In 2024 Republicans may complete a historic foreign policy reversal | CNN Politics

    In 2024 Republicans may complete a historic foreign policy reversal | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    The GOP in 2024 is moving toward a reprise of its most consequential foreign policy debate ever in a presidential primary. Only this time, the results may be reversed.

    The 1952 GOP presidential nomination fight proved a turning point in the party’s history, when Dwight Eisenhower, a champion of internationalism and alliance with Europe to contain the Soviet Union, defeated Sen. Robert Taft, a skeptic of international alliances who wanted to shift America’s focus from defending Europe toward confronting communist China.

    A similar divide is opening within the GOP now. In a distant echo of Taft, former President Donald Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, the race’s two front-runners have both declared that defending Ukraine against Russia is not an American “vital interest” and “distracts” (as DeSantis put it) from the more important challenge of confronting China. Other likely 2024 candidates, such as former Vice President Mike Pence and former UN Ambassador Nikki Haley, come closer to upholding the Eisenhower position that the US must remain steadfast in protecting Europe against Russian aggression – and insisting that abandoning Ukraine would embolden China and other potential US adversaries.

    After Eisenhower’s landmark victory over Taft in 1952, every Republican presidential nominee over the next six decades – a list that extended from Richard Nixon through Ronald Reagan to George W. Bush, John McCain and Mitt Romney – identified more with the internationalist than isolationist wing of the party.

    But Trump broke that streak when he won the nomination in 2016 behind a message of brusque economic nationalism and skepticism of international alliances. Now, the GOP appears on track for a 2024 nomination fight which may demonstrate that Trump’s rise has lastingly shifted the party’s balance of power on foreign policy – and ended the long era of GOP internationalism Eisenhower’s victory began.

    The fact that DeSantis unveiled his views about Ukraine in a statement to Fox News host Tucker Carlson, a fierce opponent of American engagement with allies, underscored the governor’s determination to court Trump’s base with his provocative remarks. After several days of intense criticism from Republican internationalists, DeSantis retreated last week from his description of the war as a “territorial dispute” and called Russian President Vladimir Putin “a war criminal,” much harsher language than Trump has ever used. But DeSantis, in his interview with British journalist Piers Morgan for another Fox outlet, also reiterated his skepticism of open-ended US support for Ukraine. “I just don’t think that’s a sufficient interest for us to escalate more involvement,” the governor said.

    Even with his qualifying statements last week, DeSantis’ skeptical posture toward Ukraine shows the magnetic pull that Trump has exerted on his party, tugging it away from the Eisenhower tradition.

    “Trump-ism is the dominant tendency in Republican foreign policy and it’s isolationist, its unilateralist, its amoral,” said Richard Haass, president of the Council on Foreign Relations and former director of policy planning at the State Department under George W. Bush. The “traditional institutional approach to the world [which was] … the dominant Republican approach since World War II … has clearly been eclipsed for now,” said Haass, who also held foreign policy positions in the Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush administrations.

    Ivo Daalder, president of the Chicago Council on Global Affairs and former US permanent representative to NATO under Barack Obama, agrees. The fact that both 2024 GOP front-runners are expressing a broad skepticism about US engagement abroad, he said, raises the possibility that Republican “internationalists have not only lost in ’16 and ‘20” when Trump headed the GOP ticket, “but have lost the party forever.”

    The 1952 presidential election, by contrast, was the moment when GOP internationalists seemed to win the party forever. Leading into World War II, the party had been closely split between an internationalist wing determined to counter Adolf Hitler and imperial Japan and an isolationist faction resistant to entanglement in the intensifying confrontation with fascism, especially in Europe. The divide was both ideological and geographic, pitting generally more moderate internationalist East Coast Republicans (many of them tied to Wall Street and international finance) against more conservative isolationist forces centered in the small towns and small businesses of the Midwest and the far West.

    The Japanese surprise attack that triggered the US entry into World War II ended the political viability of a purely isolationist stance.

    “After Pearl Harbor there was no way to be a strict isolationist and a national political [figure],” said Joyce Mao, an associate professor of history at Middlebury College and author of the book “Asia First,” which recounts the GOP foreign policy debates of that era.

    After World War II, Republican internationalists joined with Democratic presidents Franklin Roosevelt and Harry Truman to build the international institutions meant to prevent another global war: the United Nations, the Marshall Plan to economically rebuild Europe and the North Atlantic Treaty Organization to militarily defend it from the Soviet Union. Eisenhower, who had organized the Allied invasion of Europe on D-Day in 1944, was firmly in that camp and, in fact, returned to Europe in January 1951 to serve as NATO’s first supreme commander.

    But Robert Taft led a block of “old guard” congressional Republicans that remained much more skeptical of European commitments. Taft, a senator from Ohio and the son of former Republican president William Howard Taft, had generally opposed American aid to Europe before Pearl Harbor and even after the war he pushed to reduce the Marshall Plan and voted against the creation of NATO. Like many of the Republicans who initially resisted involvement in World War II, Mao noted, Robert Taft in the post-war period tried to separate himself both from that isolationist past and the contemporary priorities of GOP internationalists like Eisenhower by arguing for an “Asia First” foreign policy that would shift resources and emphasis from defending Europe to confronting the Communists who had seized control of China.

    “Eisenhower was viewed by Taft and his colleagues as much too moderate,” Mao said. “His European focus was deemed by that conservative wing of the party as much too similar to the liberal Democrats. If this was going to be a moment for conservatism to reassert itself not only against liberalism but also against the moderates in the Republican Party, China provided an ideal plank” to do so.

    All these strains culminated in the landmark battle for the 1952 GOP presidential nomination. Taft, the Republican Senate leader, was a passionate favorite of conservatives. Eisenhower, still in Europe as NATO supreme commander, was in many respects a reluctant candidate. But as Stephen Ambrose showed in his classic biography, Eisenhower felt compelled to run largely from fear that Taft would lead the US out of NATO, while simultaneously risking a catastrophic war in China. (Eisenhower was also deeply disenchanted with Truman’s leadership.) Eisenhower resigned his NATO position, returned to the US, mobilized enough support from the GOP’s internationalist wing to beat Taft at the 1952 Republican convention, and then decisively won the presidency that November. “Eisenhower became president precisely because he did not trust this version of isolationism in Taft,” said Peter Feaver, a Duke University political scientist who served as a senior adviser for strategic planning on the National Security Council under George W. Bush.

    Both as a general election candidate and as president, Eisenhower tried to minimize his public conflicts with his party’s “old guard.” But he unmistakably steered the party (and the nation) toward acceptance of American global leadership within a robust international system of alliances. With only modest variation, that became the dominant foreign policy ideology of the GOP for the next 60 years under Presidents Richard Nixon, Gerald Ford, Ronald Reagan and George H.W. Bush. Late in that period, George W. Bush offered a different emphasis by stressing unilateral American action over coordination with allies, but even he emphasized the need for the US to remain engaged with the world. “It’s a pretty unbroken streak,” said Geoffrey Kabaservice, author of “Rule and Ruin,” a history of the struggles between GOP conservatives and moderates.

    Taft-like isolationism, coupled with nativist opposition to immigration and protectionist opposition to free trade, first resurfaced as a major force in the GOP with the long-shot presidential campaigns of conservative commentator Patrick J. Buchanan in 1992 and 1996. Two decades later, Trump revived that same triumvirate of isolationism, protectionism and nativism – what scholars sometimes call “defensive nationalism” – in his winning drive for the 2016 GOP nomination.

    Though some traditional GOP internationalists had hoped that Trump in office might moderate those impulses, as president he barreled down all those roads, repeatedly clashing with traditional allies. Now, DeSantis’ choice to echo Trump in devaluing Ukraine – following the calls from so many House conservatives to reduce the US commitment there – is deflating another hope of the GOP’s beleaguered internationalist wing: that Trump’s ascent represented a temporary detour and the party would snap back to its traditional support for international engagement once he left office.

    “Trump-ism has to be taken seriously,” as a long-term force in GOP thinking about the world, Haass said. The foreign policy center of gravity in the Republican Party, he added, has moved toward “a much more pinched or minimal American relationship with the world, [with] not a lot of interest in contributing to global responses to challenges like climate change or pandemics.”

    Even before DeSantis qualified his comments in the interview with Morgan, Feaver believed the Florida governor was trying to find a position on Ukraine somewhere between Trump’s undiluted skepticism and the unreserved support of Sens. Lindsey Graham of South Carolina and Mitch McConnell of Kentucky. But, Feaver said, by including such inflammatory language as “territorial dispute” in his initial comments, DeSantis demonstrated the risks of pursuing such a strategy of “triangulation.”

    “Triangulation is a risky game because if you get the language off, you may commit yourself in a campaign to a line that makes no sense when you are governing,” Feaver said. “This is one of the hardest problems for newcomers and challengers when they are campaigning for president. By giving applause lines that work for the narrow segments of ideologically hardened factions that they are trying to win over for the primary, they can lock themselves into policy positions that are not sound when they actually win.”

    As an example, Feaver said DeSantis’ insistence that the US should shift more attention from countering Russia to containing China – an argument he repeated with Morgan – was illogical because “abandoning Ukraine assists China’s most significant ally, Russia.” Haley made a similar case in her recent Wall Street Journal article criticizing DeSantis (though not by name) for his comments to Carlson. “It’s naive to think we can counter China by ignoring Russia,” Haley wrote.

    Daalder points out another logical flaw in the updated “Asia First” arguments from DeSantis and Trump. “If the US were to abandon its allies in Europe … our allies in Asia are going to ask, ‘What’s to say they are not going to do the same with regards to China?’” Daalder said. “By demonstrating your willingness to stand up to Russia you are also strengthening the view that in Asia that when it comes to it that we will be there to help them.”

    But polls leave no doubt that both prongs of the modern Robert Taft position – that the US should reduce its commitment to Europe-focused international alliances and harden its resistance to China – have a substantial base of support in the contemporary Republican coalition. In a Gallup poll released earlier this month, by a lopsided margin of 76% to 12%, Republican voters were more likely to identify China than Russia as the principal US adversary in the world. (More Democrats picked Russia than China.) Polls have also found a steady decline in Republican support for US aid to Ukraine: polls this year by both the Pew Research Center and Quinnipiac University found that the share of GOP voters who believe the US is doing too much now equals the combined percentage who think it is doing too little or the right amount. (Quinnipiac found big majorities of Democrats and independents still believe the US is doing the right amount or not enough.)

    The latest Chicago Council on Global Affairs annual survey also tracks a broader retreat from the world among GOP voters. In that poll, conducted last November, the share of Republicans who said the US should take an active role in world affairs fell to 55% – the lowest the survey has ever recorded. Underscoring that erosion, a slight majority of Republicans in the poll said the costs of an active US international role now exceed the benefits.

    Opinions in the GOP about whether the US should do more or less in Ukraine don’t vary much along lines of education or age, the Pew poll found. But generally, these surveys show that the turn away from global leadership is most powerful among two distinct groups of Republicans: those who are younger, and those who lack college degrees. While a solid three-fifths of Republicans with a college degree in the Chicago Council poll said the benefits of US leadership exceed the costs, for instance, a majority of non-college Republicans disagreed. Younger Republicans were also much more likely than those over 60 to say the costs exceed the benefits.

    It’s probably no coincidence that those two groups – Republicans without a college degree and those who are younger – have consistently registered as Trump’s strongest supporters in early polls about the 2024 race.

    Trump is signaling that in a second term he will likely push even further in an isolationist and protectionist direction. John Bolton, Trump’s former national security adviser, has said he believed the former president came close to withdrawing the US from NATO and would likely do so if elected to a second term. Trump certainly hinted at that possibility in a recent campaign video in which he declared, “we have to finish the process we began under my administration of fundamentally reevaluating NATO’s purpose and NATO’s mission.” Trump has also said he would impose a four-year plan “to phase out all Chinese imports of essential goods, everything from electronics to steel to pharmaceuticals.” That would be a wrenching change in the global economy.

    In all these ways, Trump is promising to fulfill Robert Taft’s vision from seven decades ago – and to erase Eisenhower’s lasting victory in setting the GOP’s direction. DeSantis does not appear to have decided to jump entirely on that Trump train – but neither is he lying down on the tracks to stop it. With these two men far ahead of any potential rival, it seems highly likely that the GOP in 2024 will continue to move away from Eisenhower-style international cooperation toward a volatile compound of isolationism and unilateralism. And that could generate enormous turbulence across the globe.

    Trump’s first term, as Daalder noted, was a chaotic time for the international order and traditional US alliances. But “If an isolationist leader gets elected president in 2024,” Daalder added, “you haven’t seen nothing yet.”

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  • Preparations for ‘de-occupation’: Annexed Crimea not forgotten by Ukraine | CNN

    Preparations for ‘de-occupation’: Annexed Crimea not forgotten by Ukraine | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    While the fury of conflict echoes across the eastern Donbas region, a very different war is being waged in Crimea: one of night-time explosions, sabotage and disinformation.

    Reclaiming Crimea may seem like an unlikely quest for Ukraine but it is putting considerable effort into making Russia’s occupation as uncomfortable as possible. And the Russians are going to great lengths to fortify the peninsula, which they illegally annexed in 2014.

    That includes hiring legions of workers to build fortifications and trenches.

    The Ukrainian military has been carrying out attacks in Crimea with two goals: harass the Russian Black Sea fleet and disrupt vital Russian supply lines.

    Satellite imagery in February showed a substantial Russian build-up of equipment and armor at several points across northern Crimea.

    Few details emerge about Ukrainian strikes in Crimea. Only occasionally does unofficial social media video provide clues about what has been hit. And only occasionally do normally circumspect Ukrainian officials refer to any actions in Crimea.

    This is part of the conflict that is fought largely in the shadows, a far cry from the brutal attritional warfare that rages across Donbas.

    But last week Ukraine’s Main Intelligence reported that explosions in the Crimean town of Dzhankoi were due to a strike against Russian Kalibr cruise missiles being transported via rail. It said the strike served to “demilitarize Russia and prepare the Crimean peninsula for de-occupation.”

    There’s no way to confirm that Kalibrs were destroyed. But Russia did launch an inquiry “into a recent drone attack repelled by Russian air defense systems near the city of Dzhankoi,” which is one of the main hubs for Russian equipment moving through Crimea.

    Kalibrs would be a high priority target given the havoc they cause when fired by the Black Sea fleet at targets in Ukraine.

    Two days after the Dzhankoi explosions, the night sky above Sevastopol – the home of the Black Sea fleet – was lit up by air defenses. Social media video showed a large explosion in the harbor area. The governor of the city said a Ukrainian attack using marine drones, not the first against the port of Sevastopol, had been foiled.

    These strikes do not presage a Ukrainian plan to retake Crimea, even if that remains a distant goal for President Volodymyr Zelensky. But the peninsula is an artery through which Russia pushes troops and weapons into southern Ukraine, as well as being the defensive rear for Russian forces still holding part of Kherson region.

    Ukrainian officials say that the Russians have begun mining part of the Dnipro river delta to impede any landings in southern Kherson. Most days, there are dozens of artillery and rocket strikes by Russian forces across the river into Ukrainian-held areas of Kherson.

    There are also occasional acts of sabotage inside Crimea by unknown actors. Russian media reported an attempt to blow up a gas pipeline in the city of Simferopol this month, which caused an explosion and fire.

    The Ukrainian Resistance Center, an official agency, claimed in February that partisans had sabotaged a railway in Bakhchisaray near Sevastopol; pro-Russian social media showed modest damage to tracks.

    The extent of any partisan movement in the peninsula is unclear; at most it’s an irritant to the Russian-backed authorities – for now. There are occasional reports from the Russian-appointed authorities about the arrest of infiltrators. The United Nations reported this week that it had documented 210 prosecutions in Crimea through the end of January on the grounds of “public actions directed at discrediting” and “obstructing” the Russian armed forces.

    In this file photo taken in 2015, people walk by fresh graffiti depicting Vladimir Putin in Crimea.

    There are also occasional curfews in towns near Crimea, such as Chaplynka, through which Russian armor frequently passes – most likely to prevent any information being passed to the Ukrainian military. Ukraine alleged that last week the Russian National Guard raided Chaplynka and inspected locals’ documents, phones and vehicles.

    Another aspect to the low-key conflict in Crimea is disinformation. Radio station frequencies have been hacked — for example recently to spread fake news about an order to evacuate the peninsula. There is a constant drip-feed of claims from Kyiv designed to unsettle Russians in Crimea. On Friday Ukraine’s Defence Intelligence spokesman, Andrii Yusov, said that officials from the Russian-backed administration in Crimea were rushing to sell their property and evacuate their families.

    There is no independent evidence of an exodus of pro-Russian officials.

    While any Ukrainian offensive to reclaim Crimea is at best distant, the Russians are taking no chances. Satellite imagery shows extensive defensive fortifications such as trenches close to or in Crimea, near the town of Armiansk, for example.

    This month the Russian-appointed head of Crimea, Sergei Aksenov, said the creation of a fortification line in the peninsula was a guarantee of its security.

    Denys Chystikov, a senior Ukrainian official with responsibility for Crimea, said Friday that fortifications are being built on the coast and near the border [with mainland Ukraine, but also deeper inside Crimea. “This is being done in order to show to local population that the peninsula is preparing to repel an attack.”

    Ukrainian soldiers stand guard at a check point at the border between Ukraine and Crimea near the Salkovo village near Kherson, on March 18, 2014.

    CNN reviewed online job postings for builders and carpenters that promised up to 7,000 rubles ($90) a day plus accommodation. One read: “Laborers wanted for fortifications, 3,000-7,000 rubles, per job completed, Krasnoperekopsk,” a town just inside Crimea.

    A reporter with the Russian independent outlet Verstka was told that dozens of people were needed for the fortification work. The Ukrainian military has claimed that residents are also coerced to do the work and that defensive fortifications are being built between the towns of Ishun and Voinka in northern Crimea. A social media video appears to show the work in progress.

    It may be a prudent move by the Russians. Ukrainian intelligence officials are on record as saying that a strategic goal of any counter-offensive this spring would be to cut the occupied corridor between Crimea and the Russian border along the Sea of Azov.

    That would entail striking south towards Melitopol and into parts of Kherson adjacent to Crimea. Whether Ukrainian forces would try to enter Crimea is an open question. Much to Kyiv’s annoyance, some US officials are distinctly cool on such a prospect, feeling it would usher in unpredictable escalation. Gen. Mark Milley, the Chairman of the Joint Chiefs of Staff, said earlier this year that “it would be very, very difficult to militarily eject the Russian forces from all – every inch of Ukraine and occupied – or Russian-occupied Ukraine.”

    Ukrainian artillery unit members fire toward Kherson on October 28, 2022.

    Anchal Vohra wrote recently in Foreign Policy magazine that “while isolating Crimea is one thing, entering, attacking, and holding such a heavily fortified region guarded by the Russian naval fleet is quite another.”

    Just this week, the deputy head of Russia’s Security Council, Dmitri Medvedev, warned that Russia would use “absolutely any weapon” should Crimea try to retake Ukraine.

    As the rumor mill about the goals of a possible Ukrainian counter-offensive later this spring intensifies, so does the appetite for what the Russians call maskirovka, the art of deception. Neither side has a monopoly on that.

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  • Russia’s war in Ukraine | CNN

    Russia’s war in Ukraine | CNN

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    When the war began in February last year, the staff at Kherson’s Children’s Home came up with a plan.

    They spirited all the children, mostly under 5, to the Holhofa church on the other side of town, orphanage worker Olena recounted.

    The church and caregivers from the home kept the children safe and warm in the basement. They hid them to keep them safe from the fighting and to escape the Russians, said Olena.

    Kherson fell to the Russian forces in the early days of the war. The invading troops moved swiftly over the Dnipro River; it was the first major city to be taken and the only regional capital.

    “Yes, the children were here,” Victor, the 74-year-old caretaker of the church, told CNN. “But after the Russians occupied this city, they started asking questions.”

    After a few weeks, he said, agents from Russia’s security service, the FSB, came to the church and demanded that the caregivers transport the children back to the orphanage.

    Read the full story here.

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  • 2024 GOP field tests their messages — while largely avoiding conflict with Trump | CNN Politics

    2024 GOP field tests their messages — while largely avoiding conflict with Trump | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    As former President Donald Trump heads to Texas on Saturday for his first major campaign rally, the handbrake remains on for most of his potential 2024 rivals.

    Trump will appear in Waco just a week after he predicted his own arrest in connection with a hush money case from 2016. In the days since, anticipation grew over a potential indictment from a Manhattan grand jury, with Trump warning early Friday of “potential death and destruction” if he’s charged, though no action was taken this week.

    This latest melodrama for the former president is unfolding during an uneasy period for the rest of the 2024 GOP presidential field, which is mostly frozen in place as a host of rumored contenders travel the country to test-run their messages while also seeking to avoid conflict with Trump.

    The former president, though, operates on his own schedule and, along with his allies, used his own announcement about a coming indictment to test the loyalties of his fellow Republicans.

    “We all need to be speaking up against the political persecution of President Trump,” right-wing Colorado Rep. Lauren Boebert tweeted last weekend. “This is not the time for silence.”

    What Trump and his supporters eventually heard was a field of would-be opponents rushing to their defense – yet another sign that former president’s grip on the Republican Party remains firmly in place.

    Former Vice President Mike Pence, who has at times harshly criticized Trump over the latter’s role in the January 6, 2021, Capitol riot, fell into line almost immediately after Trump’s prediction last week.

    “The fact that the Manhattan DA thinks that indicting President Trump is his top priority, I think, it just tells you everything you need to know about the radical left in this country,” Pence said in an ABC News interview last Sunday. “It just feels like a politically charged prosecution here.”

    Former South Carolina Gov. Nikki Haley, who served as Trump’s ambassador to the United Nations, remains the only other candidate with an established national profile to formally enter the race. She too backed Trump after he floated his expected arrest, saying the potential case against him was “more about revenge than it is about justice.”

    Meanwhile, Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis, who has projected a warrior-like persona in the run-up to his own expected campaign, is still months out from an announcement. Though he took a sharper, snarkier tone when discussing Trump’s legal troubles this week, it came as he faced the fallout from his own messy, conflicting series of remarks on the Russian invasion of Ukraine.

    South Carolina Sen. Tim Scott, another potential contender, parried questions about Trump, and whether he was concerned by the behavior underlying the hush money case. Instead, he turned his ire on reporters and President Joe Biden.

    “You know, one of the things I’d say is that red-on-red violence, so to speak, is something that the mass media enjoys,” Scott said on Fox New Thursday. “The road to socialism runs through a divided Republican Party. One thing we should do is keep our focus on the actual problem: That is President Biden.”

    Further complicating DeSantis’s bid to shave support from Trump while energizing his own conservative base, his other would-be rivals – led by Haley and Pence – are increasingly framing him as a carbon copy of the former president.

    The main difference: They can go after DeSantis without fear of reprisal from Trump or his supporters.

    Pence has taken aim at DeSantis over the Florida governor’s home state war with Disney, which he targeted after the company pushed back against state GOP legislation banning certain instruction about sexual orientation and gender identity in the classroom, dubbed by critics as the “Don’t Say Gay” law.

    The former vice president argued that DeSantis’ revocation of Disney’s special tax status went too far, and that such interventions violated his principles as a “limited government Republican.”

    Both Pence and Haley have also insisted that “entitlement reform,” in the form of cutting benefits for seniors in an effort to combat what they’ve described as a funding crisis, would be on the table if they were elected. That position separates them from Trump and DeSantis – at least rhetorically – who have both pledged not to touch popular programs like Medicare and Social Security.

    For his part, DeSantis has ignored pokes from more establishment-aligned Republicans, instead attempting to land subtle jabs on Trump. Asked about the rumors of Trump’s coming indictment, DeSantis on Monday said he “no interest in getting involved in some type of manufactured circus by some Soros DA,” a reference to Democrat Alvin Bragg and billionaire liberal donor George Soros.

    But he followed that with a dig that raised the hackles of Trump and his top advisers.

    “I don’t know what goes into paying hush money to a porn star to secure silence over some type of alleged affair,” DeSantis said to laughs from some in the press corps. “I just, I can’t speak to that.”

    Trump promptly responded by posting a series of personal attacks against DeSantis on social media.

    “Ron DeSanctimonious will probably find out about FALSE ACCUSATIONS & FAKE STORIES sometime in the future, as he gets older, wiser, and better known, when he’s unfairly and illegally attacked by a woman, even classmates that are ‘underage’ (or possibly a man!),” Trump wrote. “I’m sure he will want to fight these misfits just like I do!”

    But his back-and-forth with Trump, which carried on after DeSantis landed a few more shots during an interview with Piers Morgan, was arguably less damaging to the Florida governor than his continued about-faces on Ukraine.

    After being met with a barrage of criticism from prominent Republicans for initially describing Russia’s war in Ukraine as a “territorial dispute” in a statement to Fox News host Tucker Carlson, DeSantis subsequently insisted to Morgan that he had only been addressing a longer-running part of the conflict focused in eastern Ukraine and Crimea.

    “That’s some difficult fighting,” DeSantis said of the region, “and that’s what I was referring to. And so it wasn’t that I thought Russia had a right to that (land), and so if I should have made that more clear, I could have done it.”

    By Thursday, though, DeSantis has tracked back to a more populist position, saying in an interview with Newsmax that he cares “more about securing our own border in the United States than I do about the Russia-Ukraine border.”

    The back-and-forth over Ukraine invited reproaches from Pence and Haley, along with foreign policy hawks like South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, Florida Sen. Marco Rubio and former Wyoming Rep. Liz Cheney, who all at various times either mocked or scorned DeSantis’ comments

    “When the United States supports Ukraine in their fight against Putin, we follow the Reagan doctrine, and we support those who fight our enemies on their shores, so we will not have to fight them ourselves,” Pence said in a statement. “There is no room for Putin apologists in the Republican Party.”

    The broad backlash underscored DeSantis’ uniquely tricky path to the nomination. When he hewed to Trump’s position in his initial remarks, the party establishment and anti-Trump conservatives raced to condemn him.

    But because DeSantis largely shares a voter base with the former president, staking out a clear position opposing Trump would be politically untenable.

    It is a challenge he will need to meet – and solve – as the race becomes more intense and the waiting, for candidates and action in Trump’s legal cases, comes to an end.

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  • Chicago Blackhawks won’t wear Pride warmups because of security concerns | CNN

    Chicago Blackhawks won’t wear Pride warmups because of security concerns | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    The NHL’s Chicago Blackhawks are opting not to wear specialized Pride warmup jerseys on Sunday when the team holds its Pride night, according to the Chicago Sun-Times.

    According to the report, the team is not wearing the jerseys because of security concerns involving Russian players, citing unnamed sources close to the team. The Sun-Times also reports, according to sources, that the decision was made by the front office and not the players.

    In December, Russian President Vladimir Putin signed into law a bill that expands a ban on so-called LGBTQ “propaganda” in Russia, making it illegal for anyone to promote same-sex relationships or suggest that non-heterosexual orientations are “normal.”

    CNN has reached out to the NHL for comment. “The Chicago Blackhawks organization is proud to continue its annual Pride Night celebration, an evening – alongside year-round efforts – fueled by partnership and LGBTQIA+ community engagement,” the team told CNN in a statement on Thursday.

    “Together, our activities will focus on fostering conversation and more equitable spaces in our pursuit to make hockey more inclusive. We do not condone anti-LGBTQIA+ rhetoric, and we stand firmly with the community.

    “While we know game-day celebrations like these are an important way we can use our platform to bring visibility, it is the work we do together 365 days a year that can create true impact in ensuring all of our colleagues, fans and communities feel welcomed and safe within our sport.”

    On the Blackhawks’ website, advertising for the Pride night promotion for the team’s Sunday game against the Vancouver Canucks, says: “Pride Night brings the entire Blackhawks organization together to celebrate the LGBTQIA+ community and stand together for inclusion. A special pregame event in the United Center Atrium will kick off the evening featuring special performances, photo opportunities and more.”

    The Blackhawks currently have one Russian-born player on their roster, defenseman Nikita Zaitsev, who is from Moscow, and there are also other players on the team who have ties to Russia.

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  • Biden to highlight US-Canadian unity in first presidential trip to Ottawa | CNN Politics

    Biden to highlight US-Canadian unity in first presidential trip to Ottawa | CNN Politics

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    Ottawa, Canada
    CNN
     — 

    President Joe Biden will make a long-awaited trip to America’s northern neighbor Thursday evening, a 24-hour whirlwind visit where he will press to elevate a concerted effort to repair a bilateral relationship as the two nations confront growing geopolitical challenges.

    Despite the brief nature of the trip, White House officials say the crowded agenda underscores the relationship’s importance – and the substantial shift away from the fractures that developed during former President Donald Trump’s time in office. Still, they acknowledge there are a series of economic, trade and immigration challenges that must be navigated between the two governments.

    Biden’s visit includes a meeting with Canadian Prime Minister Justin Trudeau, an address to the nation’s parliament in Ottawa, and a cozy reception at an elaborate gala dinner. For Biden, who last traveled to Ottawa shortly after Trump was elected in 2016, the visit will also mark a moment to underscore close ties and the critical role Canada has played in the Western alliance that has supported Ukraine since Russia’s invasion more than a year ago.

    “This visit is about taking stock of what we’ve done, where we are, and what we need to prioritize for the future,” said White House National Security Council strategic communications coordinator John Kirby.

    The two leaders and political allies are expected to discuss North American supply chains and critical minerals, climate change, the opioid crisis and critical defense cooperation – including efforts to modernize the North American Aerospace Defense Command. And while no major breakthroughs are expected, thornier issues like the deteriorating situation in Haiti, immigration and trade are also expected to be on the agenda.

    “We’re going to talk about our two democracies stepping up to meet the challenges of our time. That includes taking concrete steps to increase defense spending, driving a global race to the top on clean energy, and building prosperous and inclusive economies,” Kirby told reporters on Wednesday.

    Biden will “reaffirm the United States’ commitment to the US-Canada partnership and promote our shared security, shared prosperity, and shared values,” press secretary Karine Jean-Pierre wrote in a statement announcing the trip earlier this month.

    The two men are also expected to discuss Russia’s ongoing invasion of Ukraine. Trudeau, the longest-serving leader in the G7, has been an ally to Biden in providing military and financial assistance to the country during the Kremlin’s invasion.

    “This is a meaningful visit. Canada is one of the United States’ closest allies and friends and has been now for more than 150 years,” Kirby added.

    Vincent Rigby, a former national security and intelligence adviser to Trudeau and current senior adviser at CSIS, told CNN that as Biden travels to Ottawa with “the world on his mind,” the current geopolitical environment in the Indo-Pacific and Eastern Europe means that Canadian security contributions will be a key topic in Friday’s bilateral meeting.

    “I think the big question is going to be, OK, Canada, where do you stand on all this? And I would suggest that Canada has been struggling to match some of its allies over the last number of years in responding to this unstable security environment. So it will probably be the elephant in the room to a certain extent,” he told CNN.

    Rigby noted that while efforts to increase Canadian defense spending, modernize NORAD or contain China are not new, it’s an issue that has garnered a greater public profile the last few months following the Chinese spy balloon’s incursion into North American airspace and recent allegations about Beijing attempting to interfere in Canadian elections.

    While Canada has announced $3.8 billion in spending to help upgrade NORAD and has recently purchased F-35s, Canada’s overall percentage of GDP spent on defense remains well below the 2% asked of NATO members.

    “I think that the prime minister needs to reassure the president that he’s going to do what’s necessary to have a military in Canada that’s ready to respond to these kinds of threats, particularly on the international stage,” Rigby added. “This isn’t just about blindly following the United States’ lead. It’s about doing what’s right for Canada and Canada’s national interest.”

    Preparations for the president’s visit were already well-underway on Wednesday with American and Canadian flags draped along Wellington Street across the way from the Parliament complex, and Canadian security services – buttressed by police units from neighboring cities like Toronto – conducting practice runs for expected motorcade routes.

    Biden’s travel agenda will kick into gear from the moment he lands at Ottawa International Airport on Thursday night, when he will hold a bilateral meeting with the governor general of Canada – the country’s apolitical and ceremonial head of state – followed by a meet and greet at Trudeau’s official residence.

    On Friday, Biden makes the short trip from his hotel to Parliament Hill where will have a bilateral with Trudeau, an expanded meeting with their respective staff, and then Biden’s address to Parliament. The two leaders will then hold a joint news conference in the afternoon before Friday evening’s dinner ahead of a late evening flight back to the US.

    First lady Dr. Jill Biden – who is accompanying her husband in Ottawa – will also take part in additional events with Sophie Grégoire Trudeau, the prime minister’s wife.

    Despite being fellow liberals and political allies who are closely aligned on many issues, Prime Minister Trudeau and President Biden have had their share of disagreements. Early on in Biden’s administration, Trudeau expressed disappointment over the president’s unwillingness to back off his decision to cancel the Keystone XL pipeline and the Canadians have previously raised concerns over the impact of “Buy American” measures on trade between the two countries.

    And while Friday’s meetings will heavily feature areas of cooperation between the two countries, there will also be discussions on more complicated issues like immigration, trade and Haiti.

    As both leaders face an influx of migrants and mounting political pressure, they will be pressed to finalize changes to the Safe Third Country Agreement. Trudeau has been facing blowback domestically over hundreds of migrants crossing Roxham Road, a remote street that connects Champlain, New York, with Hemmingford, Quebec.

    “The only way to effectively shut down, not just Roxham Road but the entire border, to these irregular crossings is to renegotiate the Safe Third Country Agreement,” Trudeau said at a news conference last month, pointing to the thousands of kilometers of shared unguarded border between the US and Canada and adding that people will cross elsewhere even if the Roxham Road access point is closed.

    Signed in 2002, the agreement applies to people transiting through a country where they could have claimed asylum because it’s deemed safe. It means that anyone entering a land port of entry could be ineligible to make a claim and therefore returned to the US. But Roxham Road is not an official crossing, meaning that people who transit there could still seek protections in Canada even though they passed through the US.

    Biden and Trudeau have previously touted their relationship on a slew of issues, including in accepting refugees, and CNN reported earlier this month that it’s unlikely the latest migration trend along the northern border will damage that bond.

    Kirby, a top White House official, said Wednesday the US is “well aware” of Canadian concerns regarding migration and that he has “no doubt” the two leaders will discuss it.

    “We’ll be talking about issues of migration, which affects us both. There are more people on the move in this hemisphere than there have been since World War Two and that affects both our countries,” he said.

    Fueling the increase in immigration this year and also expected to be brought up in Friday’s talks are discussions on the ongoing crisis in Haiti where the government is edging closer to becoming a failed state as criminal gangs in the capital become increasingly violent and the country faces interlocking health, energy and security crises.

    United Nations officials are warning that the situation “continues to spiral out of control,” and in the first two weeks of March, the gang violence has killed 208 people, injured 164 others and led to 101 kidnappings, according to the UN. Last year there were 2,183 homicides and 1,359 kidnappings in Haiti, which nearly doubles the statistics from the previous year, according to the UN.

    Late last year the United States drafted a UN Security Council resolution, following calls from the Haitian government for outside intervention, to support the deployment of a rapid action force to Haiti to help the government’s national police wrest back control of the crisis-ridden country.

    While the US has no plans to lead such a force, national security adviser Jake Sullivan said in January that Canada had “expressed interest in taking on a leadership role.” Although Kirby on Wednesday said that they’re not yet at a point where all the players involved can make any definitive decisions and that the two leaders will continue their discussions.

    “We have continued to stand with the people of Haiti, and we will continue to. Obviously, this current situation is heart wrenching and we need to continue to be there for the people of Haiti. But we need to make sure that the solutions are driven by the people of Haiti themselves,” Trudeau said in January, pointing to the military and financial support Canada and the US have already provided.

    Part of the calculus for Canada, according to Rigby, is that any sort of military intervention could potentially become a “quagmire” and would require distinct objectives and goals. But also, as Canada’s top general has publicly acknowledged, the Canadian armed forces may lack the capacity to lead such a mission.

    “It might be a bridge too far for them to go into Haiti. So that’s why I think you’re seeing a little bit of reluctance on the part of the Canadian government to engage on Haiti as much as I think they’d like to help,” Rigby told CNN.

    American presidents typically visit Canada as one of their first trips abroad, but the ongoing Covid-19 pandemic and war in Ukraine at the beginning of Biden’s administration complicated matters and delayed Biden’s first visit North. Instead, the newly minted US president in early 2021 opted for his first phone call and virtual bilateral meeting to be with Trudeau.

    “When we work together, as the closest of friends should, we only make each other stronger,” Biden said at the time.

    Since then, the Bidens have hosted the Trudeaus at the White House and the two men have met repeatedly in other international fora and on the sidelines of other multilateral settings, including most recently in January at a summit of North American leaders.

    Biden and Trudeau have known each other for years and describe their relationship as a close one that has only grown more critical in the year since Russia’s invasion.

    One of Biden’s final trips as vice president was to attend a state dinner held in his honor in Ottawa; during his toast, Biden recounted the call he received from Trudeau’s father Pierre – then serving as prime minister – when his first wife and daughter died in a car accident.

    It’s a personal element that helped animate a level of warmth Biden attempted to convey at the time despite the trepidation among US allies about what the next administration would mean for relations.

    “The friendship between us is absolutely critical to the United States, our well-being, our security, our sense of ourselves,” Biden said at the time.

    But he also implicitly framed what would become a turbulent four years ahead – and pointed directly to the younger Trudeau as someone who would become a critical player during that period.

    “The world’s going to spend a lot of time looking to you, Mr. Prime Minister, as we see more and more challenges to the liberal international order than any time since the end of World War II,” Biden told Trudeau at the time.

    Biden’s predecessor Donald Trump visited Canada only once for a Group of 7 summit in Quebec. The two leader’s bad blood was on full display afterward when Trump revoked his signature from a joint statement and called Trudeau “very dishonest and weak” on Twitter.

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  • Defiant Putin visits occupied Mariupol, symbol of Ukrainian resistance | CNN

    Defiant Putin visits occupied Mariupol, symbol of Ukrainian resistance | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    Vladimir Putin has visited Russian-occupied Mariupol, in an apparently defiant move reported by the Kremlin just days after the International Criminal Court issued an arrest warrant for him.

    Putin was flown into Mariupol by helicopter and toured districts around the city in a car, according to a Kremlin statement issued on Sunday.

    It said the Russian leader had stopped to speak to residents in the city’s Nevsky neighborhood and claimed he was invited into a resident’s home. It did not make clear when the visit took place.

    News of the visit comes after the ICC issued arrest warrants on Friday for Putin and Russian official Maria Lvova-Belova for an alleged scheme to deport Ukrainian children to Russia.

    The visit is likely to be seen as particularly provocative to Ukrainians as Mariupol was long a symbol of resistance that has witnessed some of the most intense fighting since Russia launched its invasion last year.

    The Kremlin said Putin also examined the coastline of Mariupol, visiting a yacht club and theater building.

    Russian Deputy Prime Minister Marat Khusnullin spoke in detail to Putin about “ongoing construction and restoration work” in the city.

    The Kremlin added that Putin held a meeting at the command post of the special military operation in Rostov-on-Don.

    Putin heard reports from the Chief of the General Staff – First Deputy Minister of Defense Valery Gerasimov, and a number of military leaders, the statement continued.

    Mariupol, a port city on the Sea of Azov, is located in Ukraine’s Donetsk Oblast and has been under direct Russian control since May 2022.

    It was in Mariupol that Russian forces carried out some of their most notorious strikes, including an attack on a maternity ward last March and the bombing of a theater which forced hundreds of civilians to seek refuge.

    Mariupol became a symbol of Ukrainian resistance during weeks of relentless Russian attacks last year. Famously, even when most of the city had fallen, its defenders held out at the Azovstal steel plant for weeks before the stronghold finally fell.

    Defense analysts previously told CNN that Russian forces tried to flatten Mariupol to make the city “easier to control.”

    Of the 450,000 people who lived in the city before the war, more than a third have already left.

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  • US military releases footage of Russian fighter jet forcing down American drone over Black Sea | CNN Politics

    US military releases footage of Russian fighter jet forcing down American drone over Black Sea | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    US European Command released footage of the Tuesday encounter between a US surveillance drone and the Russian fighter jets as it played out over the Black Sea.

    The newly declassified video depicts critical moments in the mid-air encounter, which the Pentagon said lasted between 30 and 40 minutes.

    The video shows the camera of the MQ-9 Reaper drone pointed backward toward its tail and the drone’s propeller, which is mounted on the rear, spinning. Then, a Russian Sukhoi SU-27 fighter jet is shown approaching. As it draws closer, the Russian fighter jet dumps fuel as it intercepts the US drone.

    In another portion of the footage, the Russian jet makes another pass. As it approaches, it again dumps fuel. The video from the drone is then disrupted as the Russian fighter jet collides with the MQ-9 Reaper, damaging the propeller and ultimately forcing the US to bring down the drone in the Black Sea. Russia has denied that a collision occurred.

    When the camera comes back online in the footage, the view is again pointed backward, and the propeller is shown damaged from the collision. With the propeller damaged, the drone operators effectively flew the aircraft as a glider as it descended over the Black Sea, bringing it down in international waters southwest of Crimea. On its way down, two US officials told CNN the operators remotely wiped the drone’s sensitive software, mitigating the risk of secret materials falling into enemy hands before it crashed into the water.

    The downing of the drone marked the first time Russian and US military aircraft have come into direct physical contact since Moscow launched its invasion of Ukraine.

    Despite the release of the dramatic footage, and the back-and-forth over who is to blame, the Biden administration has not said it will take action against Russia over the downing of the drone, perhaps indicating a desire to not further escalate tensions after the Kremlin said Wednesday that relations between Moscow and Washington are at their “lowest point.”

    A senior Biden administration official said the footage “absolutely confirms” that there was a physical collision and dumping of fuel, but it does not confirm the pilot’s intent.

    On Wednesday two US officials familiar with the intelligence told CNN that senior officials at the Russian Ministry of Defense gave the order for the Russian fighter jets to harass a US drone over the Black Sea this week.

    The high-level military officials’ connection to the incident suggests that the fighter jet pilots were not taking rogue action when they interfered with the US drone.

    But, at this time there is no indication that the highest of political leaders in Russia – particularly those in the Kremlin, including President Vladimir Putin – knew about the planned aggression in advance, one of the US officials said.

    National Security Council communications coordinator John Kirby said on “CNN This Morning” Wednesday that the drone had not been recovered and that he was “not sure” the US would be able to recover it.

    Moscow had made clear it would attempt to retrieve the wreckage of the drone and the US believes Russia has recovered some debris, a US official familiar with the matter told CNN. The official described the recovered wreckage as pieces of fiberglass or small bits of the drone.

    The Kremlin has said a decision on whether to retrieve the drone will come from Russia’s Ministry of Defense.

    “This is the prerogative of the military. If they believe that it is necessary for our interests and our security in the Black Sea, they will do it,” Kremlin spokesperson Dmitry Peskov told reporters on a conference call Thursday.

    Peskov said he did not know what the ministry has decided.

    Moscow and Washington have been in contact through military and diplomatic channels.

    The US is conducting an assessment of its drone operations in the Black Sea area following the incident, four US officials tell CNN.

    It has not stopped the flights entirely amid the assessment – the military sent the same model of drone, an MQ-9 Reaper, on a mission in approximately the same area over the Black Sea shortly after the collision occurred, US officials told CNN, in an effort to survey the crash site and monitor Russian efforts to look for the debris.

    But the US military is “taking a close look” at the drone’s routes and assessing how to better deconflict with Russian forces, the officials said, who have been regularly flying their fighter jets in and out of Crimea. The Pentagon has asked European Command to justify surveillance flights in the area going forward in part to assess risk, a senior US military official said.

    The US is considering conducting another drone flight over the Black Sea in the coming days, the officials said. That is generally consistent with the drones’ typical operating schedule, which can fluctuate, they added.

    Officials also plan to analyze the overall costs and benefits of flying these missions, comparing the potential intelligence value of a particular route versus the risk of escalation with Russia.

    Officials also plan to analyze the overall costs and benefits of flying these missions, comparing the potential intelligence value of a particular route versus the risk of escalation with Russia.

    Russia accused the US of violating airspace they said they created for their “special military operation” in Ukraine – a designation the US does not accept and the officials told CNN that Russia has not communicated any such airspace restriction.

    Asked on Thursday whether the US had flown any drone missions over the Black Sea since the collision on Tuesday, Pentagon press secretary Brig. Gen. Pat Ryder declined to comment on “specific missions, routes, and timelines of operations.”

    “I think Secretary Austin was pretty clear that we’re going to continue to fly and operate in international airspace where international law allows and that includes the Black Sea region,” Ryder said.

    The first official noted there is concern among some in the US military that limiting routes will impact intelligence gathering related to the Ukraine war. But the US also has other intelligence-gathering methods it utilizes when it is not conducting drone flights in the area, such as spy satellites.

    This story has been updated with additional details.

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  • Iga Swiatek: World No.1 calls for more support for Ukrainian tennis players | CNN

    Iga Swiatek: World No.1 calls for more support for Ukrainian tennis players | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    World No.1 Iga Świątek has called for more support for Ukrainian players from the Women’s Tennis Association (WTA), adding that “everything we discuss in tennis is about Belarusian and Russian players.”

    Świątek’s comments on Tuesday follow incidents at the Indian Wells tournament, where Russia’s Anastasia Potapova wore a Spartak Moscow soccer jersey, and Ukrainian player Lesia Tsurenko pulled out of the tournament this week.

    Tsurenko had been due to play against Belarusian Aryna Sabalenka but did not end up taking to the court Monday, with Reuters news agency reporting that organizers said that the Ukrainian had withdrawn for personal reasons.

    When asked about Tsurenko at her post-match press conference, the 21-year-old Polish star Świątek said: “I totally understand why she withdrew, because honestly I respect the Ukrainian girls so much, because if like a bomb landed in my country or if my home was destroyed, I don’t know if I could handle that.”

    As of March 12, at least 8,231 civilians have been killed and 13,734 injured in Russia’s invasion of Ukraine, which began 24 February last year, according to the Office of the United Nations High Commissioner for Human Rights.

    OHCHR says it believes that the actual figures are “considerably higher, as the receipt of information from some locations where intense hostilities have been going on has been delayed and many reports are still pending corroboration.”

    “I feel more should be done to help Ukrainian players because everything we discuss in tennis is about Belarusian and Russian players,” Świątek said Tuesday.

    Świątek was also critical of the WTA’s leadership after Russian Potapova entered the court Sunday wearing a Spartak Moscow soccer shirt ahead of her match against American Jessica Pegula. Potopova has been pictured wearing the shirt on several occasions, including in Dubai, in a photo she posted to her own Instagram account.

    “It’s a tough situation,” Świątek said.”There is a lot of tension in the locker room that, well, obviously it’s going to be there, because there is a war.

    “But maybe it should be a little bit less if the WTA put some action at the beginning to kind of explain to everybody what is right and what is not,” Świątek added.

    CNN reached out to the WTA for comment following Świątek’s criticism.

    Earlier on Tuesday when asked about Tsurenko’s withdrawal the WTA said to CNN: “First and foremost, we acknowledge the emotions Lesia and all of our Ukrainian athletes have and continue to manage during this very difficult period of time.

    “We are witnessing an ongoing horrific war that continues to bring unforeseen circumstances with far reaching consequences that are affecting the world, as well as the global WTA Tour and its members.

    “The WTA has consistently reflected our full support for Ukraine and strongly condemn the actions that have been brought forth by the Russian Government.

    “With this, a fundamental principle of the WTA remains, which is ensuring that individual athletes may participate in professional tennis events based on merit and without any form of discrimination, and not penalized due to the decisions made by the leadership of their country,” the WTA statement added.

    Three-time grand slam winner Świątek continued her impressive form on Wednesday, reaching the quarterfinals at Indian Wells after defeating Emma Raducanu 6-3 6-1.

    On Tuesday, Świątek beat 2019 US Open champion Bianca Andreescu in straight sets.

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  • The two biggest 2024 Republican names would mean bad news for Ukraine | CNN Politics

    The two biggest 2024 Republican names would mean bad news for Ukraine | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    Russia might be bogged down in its vicious onslaught on Ukraine, but President Vladimir Putin is winning big elsewhere – in the Republican presidential primary.

    The two highest-polling potential GOP nominees – former President Donald Trump and Florida Gov. Ron DeSantis – are making clear that if they make it to the White House, Ukraine’s lifeline of US weapons and ammunition would be in danger and the war could end on Putin’s terms. Their stands underscore rising antipathy among grassroots conservatives to the war and President Joe Biden’s marshaling of the West to bankroll Kyiv’s resistance to Putin’s unprovoked invasion.

    “The death and destruction must end now!” Trump wrote in replies to a questionnaire from Fox News’ Tucker Carlson about the war and US involvement. DeSantis, answering the same questions, countered with his most unequivocal signal yet that he’d downgrade US help for Ukraine if he wins the presidency. “We cannot prioritize intervention in an escalating foreign war over the defense of our own homeland,” he wrote.

    Trump’s warnings that only he can stop World War III and DeSantis’ main argument that saving Ukraine is not a core US national security interest will likely gain even more traction following one of the most alarming moments yet in the war on Tuesday. The apparent downing of a US drone by a Russian fighter jet over the Black Sea was a step closer to the scenario that everyone has dreaded since the war erupted a year ago – a direct clash between US and Russian forces.

    “This incident should serve as a wake-up call to isolationists in the United States that it is in our national interest to treat Putin as the threat he truly is,” Mississippi Sen. Roger Wicker, the ranking Republican on the Armed Services Committee, said in a Tuesday statement that read as an implicit rebuke of his party’s leading presidential hopefuls. Others, like Texas Sen. John Cornyn, said DeSantis’ position “raises questions.”

    But the reproach from some senior Senate Republicans may not matter much in today’s GOP. As they fight to outdo one another’s skepticism of Western help for Ukraine, Trump and DeSantis are showing how “America First” Republicans have transformed a party that was led by President Ronald Reagan to victory over the Soviet Union in the Cold War. Their influence is sure to deepen the split in the US House between traditional GOP hawks and followers of the ex-president that is already threatening future aid to Ukraine – even before the 2024 presidential election.

    That divide is playing out in the early exchanges of the GOP primary race as other candidates, including ex-UN ambassador Nikki Haley and former Vice President Mike Pence, warn that failing to stop Putin now could lead to disastrous confrontations later. Haley staked out a far more hawkish position on Ukraine in a statement on Tuesday. The former South Carolina governor warned that Russia’s goal was to wipe Ukraine off the map, and that if Kyiv “stopped fighting, Ukraine would no longer exist, and other countries would legitimately fear they would be next.”

    But her position might help explain why she’s trailing in early polls of the race. A new CNN/SSRS poll on Tuesday, for instance, found that 80% of Republicans or Republican-leaning independents thought it was important that the GOP nominee for president believe the US “should not be involved in the war between Russia and Ukraine.”

    GOP political calculations will have a profound geopolitical impact.

    Rising Republican skepticism of US aid to Ukraine presents President Volodymyr Zelensky with the most critical test yet of his international campaign for the weapons and ammunition Ukraine needs to survive. It will also bolster Putin’s apparent belief that he can outlast Western resolve and eventually crush Ukrainian resistance. The possibility that a Republican successor in the White House could abandon Ukraine will also become a bigger issue for Biden, increasing the pressure on him to shore up support among Americans for his policy in Ukraine, which polls show has ebbed a bit in recent months.

    If the war is still going on next year, the 2024 election could become a forum for a wide-ranging debate that will ask the American people to decide between twin impulses that have often divided the nation throughout its history – does the US have a duty to stand up for freedom and democracy anywhere, or should it indulge its more isolationist tendencies?

    Unless Trump or DeSantis fade in the coming months, Ukraine’s fate could effectively be on the ballot in primary races next year and in the November general election. And Biden’s vow to stick with Zelensky “for as long as it takes” could have an expiration date of January 20, 2025 – the next presidential inauguration.

    The rhetoric on Russia coming from the biggest 2024 names caused alarm on Capitol Hill, where many top Republican House committee chairman and senior senators are pressing Biden to do more to support Ukraine – including with the dispatch of F-16 fighter jets.

    Speaking on Hugh Hewitt’s radio program, Sen. Marco Rubio seemed to rebuke his state’s governor – arguing the US does have a national security interest in Ukraine and wondering whether DeSantis’ inexperience was a factor. “I don’t know what he’s trying to do or what the goal is. Obviously, he doesn’t deal with foreign policy every day as governor, so I’m not sure,” Rubio said.

    South Carolina Sen. Lindsey Graham, who’s already backed Trump’s 2024 White House bid, warned that those who said Ukraine didn’t matter were also effectively saying the same of war crimes.

    “We’re not invading Russia, we’re trying to expel the Russians from Ukraine, and no Americans are dying, and it is in our national interest to get this right,” Graham told CNN’s Manu Raju.

    Still, while Rubio and Graham represent traditional GOP foreign policy orthodoxy, their comments may only help DeSantis and Trump make their points since many pro-Trump voters often see them as part of a neo-conservative bloc in the party that led the US into years of war in the Middle East.

    South Dakota Sen. John Thune, the No. 2 Senate Republican, also said he disagreed with DeSantis, but he acknowledged that his own stance may not reflect where his party is now. “There are probably going to be other candidates in ’24 on our side who may share that view, and certainly it’s held by Republicans around the country,” Thune said of DeSantis’ perspective.

    The most noteworthy replies to Carlson’s questionnaire came from DeSantis, who has not yet officially launched a campaign, but was revealed by Tuesday’s CNN/SSRS poll to be Trump’s most threatening potential rival. The governor is encroaching on the ex-president’s ideological turf, and after speaking out more generally against current US policy in recent weeks, has now adopted a position apparently designed to hedge against the ex-president’s attacks on the issue.

    “While the U.S. has many vital national interests – securing our borders, addressing the crisis of readiness within our military, achieving energy security and independence, and checking the economic, cultural, and military power of the Chinese Communist Party – becoming further entangled in a territorial dispute between Ukraine and Russia is not one of them,” DeSantis said.

    In response to a question about whether the US should support “regime change” in Russia, the Florida governor appeared to suggest the US is engaged in such a policy, warning that any replacement for Putin might prove “even more ruthless.” There is no indication that the US government is engaged in any attempt to topple Putin. DeSantis did not specifically say he would halt US military aid to Ukraine, leaving himself some political leeway if he were elected president. There remains some doubt about his true beliefs since CNN’s KFile has reported that as a member of Congress he called for the US to send lethal aid to Ukraine.

    But his most recent comments were remarkable in echoing Putin’s talking points. By referring to a “territorial dispute,” the governor minimized Russia’s unprovoked invasion of a sovereign nation that Putin insists has no right to exist. His answer on regime change also bolsters a yearslong claim by the Russian leader that Washington is trying to drive him from power, and may be highlighted by the propagandists in Moscow’s official media.

    DeSantis’ responses to Carlson on the war also underscore how the normal relationship between political leaders and media commentators has been inverted by Fox and its star anchor. Carlson warmly approved of DeSantis’ answers, which appeared calculated to win his approval. This put Carlson in the amazing position of potentially curating what could end up being US foreign policy on one of the most critical questions since the end of the Cold War.

    House Speaker Kevin McCarthy recently performed a similar genuflection, providing Carlson with exclusive access to US Capitol surveillance tapes from the January 6, 2021, insurrection, which the Fox anchor used to undermine the truth about the most serious attack on US democracy of the modern era.

    In his responses to Carlson, Trump repeated his unprovable claim that Russia would never have invaded Ukraine if he were president. He demanded an end to the fighting and peace talks that would effectively vindicate the invasion by Putin, to whom he often fawned when he was in the Oval Office. “The President must meet with each side, then both sides together, and quickly work out a deal. This can be easily done if conducted by the right President,” Trump said. “Both sides are weary and ready to make a deal,” he added, in a comment that does not reflect the reality of the war.

    Given that her views contradict Carlson’s, Haley publicly released her answers on Ukraine – and also accused DeSantis of copying Trump’s positions.

    “The Russian government is a powerful dictatorship that makes no secret of its hatred of America. Unlike other anti-American regimes, it is attempting to brutally expand by force into a neighboring pro-American country,” she wrote. “It also regularly threatens other American allies. America is far better off with a Ukrainian victory than a Russian victory.”

    Haley’s statement epitomized the divisions on the war that will animate Republican primary debates that begin later this year – and that will be closely watched in both Kyiv and Moscow. She wouldn’t be Putin’s preferred candidate.

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  • Russian fighter jet forces down US drone over Black Sea | CNN Politics

    Russian fighter jet forces down US drone over Black Sea | CNN Politics

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    CNN
     — 

    A Russian fighter jet forced down a US Air Force drone over the Black Sea on Tuesday after damaging the propeller of the American MQ-9 Reaper drone, according to the US military.

    The Reaper drone and two Russian Su-27 aircraft were flying over international waters over the Black Sea on Tuesday when one of the Russian jets intentionally flew in front of and dumped fuel on the unmanned drone several times, a statement from US European Command said.

    The aircraft then hit the propeller of the drone, prompting US forces to bring the MQ-9 drone down in international waters. Pentagon spokesman Brig. Gen. Patrick Ryder added Tuesday that the Russian aircraft flew “in the vicinity” of the drone for 30 to 40 minutes before colliding just after 7 a.m. Central European Time.

    “Our MQ-9 aircraft was conducting routine operations in international airspace when it was intercepted and hit by a Russian aircraft, resulting in a crash and complete loss of the MQ-9,” Air Force Gen. James B. Hecker, commander of US Air Forces Europe and Air Forces Africa, said in the statement. “In fact, this unsafe and unprofessional act by the Russians nearly caused both aircraft to crash.”

    The incident marks the first time Russian and US military aircraft have come into direct physical contact since Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine just over a year ago and is likely to increase tensions between the two nations, with US calling Russia’s actions “reckless, environmentally unsound and unprofessional.”

    Russian Ambassador to the US Anatoly Antonov said that Russia does not want “confrontation” between his country and the US after he was summoned to the State Department following the downing of the drone.

    “We prefer not to create a situation where we can face unintended clashes or unintended incidents between the Russian Federation and the United States,” Antonov said.

    Antonov, who was inside the State Department for a little over half an hour, said Assistant Secretary Karen Donfried conveyed the US’ concerns about the incident and that they “exchanged our remarks on this issue because we have some differences.”

    “It seems to me that it was a constructive conversation on this issue. I have heard her remarks, I hope that she has understood what I have mentioned,” Antonov said in response to a question from CNN.

    He also claimed that Russia “had informed about this space that was identified as a zone for special military operation.”

    “We have warned not to enter, not to penetrate,” he said, asking how the US would react if a Russian drone came close to New York or San Francisco.

    Antonov reiterated a denial issued by the Russian Ministry of Defense on the incident. They denied the Russian jet had come into contact with the drone in a statement earlier on Tuesday, saying the fighter jets “scrambled to identify the intruder” after detecting it over the Black Sea, adding that the drone “went into an unguided flight with a loss of altitude.”

    “The drone flew with its transponders off, violating the boundaries of the temporary airspace regime established for the special military operation, communicated to all users of international airspace, and published in accordance with international standards,” the ministry said.

    President Joe Biden was briefed on the incident by national security adviser Jake Sullivan on Tuesday morning, according to National Security Council communications coordinator John Kirby. Defense Department officials “have not spoken specifically to Russian authorities” on the incident, Ryder said.

    Price said separately that the US has “engaged at high levels with our allies and partners” to brief them on the incident. He added that the US was “not in a position to speak to what the Russians intended to do” with the maneuvers, but that ultimately the intent mattered less than “what actually transpired.”

    Kirby said it was “not uncommon” for Russian aircraft to intercept US aircraft over the Black Sea, and said there had been other intercepts in recent weeks.

    But he said the episode Tuesday was unique in how “unsafe, unprofessional and reckless” the Russian actions were.

    The US Defense Department is currently working to declassify imagery from the incident, Ryder said Tuesday. He also said that Russia has not recovered the downed drone.

    Speaking with CNN’s Jake Tapper on “The Lead” on Tuesday, Kirby said the US has “taken steps to protect our equities with respect to that particular drone.”

    “We obviously don’t want to see anybody getting their hands on it beyond us,” Kirby said. He added that the US rejects Russia’s denial of responsibility, saying that people “should take everything that the Russians say about what they’re doing in and around Ukraine with a huge grain of salt.”

    Russian and US aircraft have operated over the Black Sea during the course of the Ukraine war, but this is the first known such interaction, a potentially dangerous escalation at a critical time in the fighting.

    The US has been operating Reaper drones over the Black Sea since before the beginning of the war, using the spy drones to monitor the area. Reaper drones can fly as high as 50,000 feet, according to the Air Force, and they have sensors and capabilities to gather intelligence and perform reconnaissance for extended periods of time, making it an ideal platform to track movements on the battlefield and in the Black Sea.

    This story has been updated with additional details.

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  • China’s new defense minister is a general the US sanctioned for buying Russian weapons | CNN

    China’s new defense minister is a general the US sanctioned for buying Russian weapons | CNN

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    CNN
     — 

    China on Sunday appointed a US-sanctioned general as its new defense minister.

    The country’s rubber-stamp legislature unanimously confirmed the appointment of General Li Shangfu, a veteran of the People’s Liberation Army’s modernization drive, during a session on Sunday.

    Experts said the appointment would be closely watched by Washington given Li’s background, even though the post is viewed as largely diplomatic and ceremonial.

    In 2018, the administration of former US President Donald Trump sanctioned Li and China’s Equipment Development Department – which he was in charge of at the time – for purchasing Russian weapons, including a Su-35 combat aircraft and a S-400 surface-to-air missile system.

    His appointment was one of a series confirmed by China’s National People’s Congress during its Sunday sitting. Other senior appointments included four new vice premiers – Ding Xuexiang, He Lifeng, Zhang Guoqing, and Liu Guozhong.

    Following their nomination by the new premier Li Qiang, all four will serve as vice premiers on the State Council, the body responsible for reviving China’s economy after three years of strict zero-Covid restrictions.

    The appointment of Li Shangfu as defense minister comes at a time of increasingly strained relations between Beijing and Washington.

    Defense experts told Reuters that his appointment likely reflected a reward for his work in modernizing China’s military.

    In 2016, Li was named deputy commander of the PLA’s then-new Strategic Support Force, an elite body tasked with accelerating the development of China’s space and cyber warfare capabilities. He was then appointed head of the Equipment Development Department of the Central Military Commission (CMC), China’s governing defense body, headed by the country’s leader Xi Jinping, Reuters reported.

    Defense experts said Li’s history as a technocrat and aerospace engineer who worked in China’s satellite program would play a key part in his new role.

    “The operational and technological background of the next Chinese defense minister is especially pertinent given that the PLA aims to become a world-class military by 2049,” James Char from Singapore’s S. Rajaratnam School of International Studies told Reuters.

    “I think he has been elevated to this position because he’s delivered for Xi Jinping in key areas of modernisation,” Singapore-based security analyst Alexander Neill from Hawaii’s Pacific Forum think-tank told Reuters.

    “This is someone who will have to hold their own in front of an international audience.”

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